October 21, 2017

Diving in the Red Sea, Egypt

October 21, 2017/ Samantha Parsons

As we mentioned in a prior blog post, we spent four days diving in the Red Sea in Egypt! We were scuba certified before the trip and did our Open Water course dives in freezing water in South Africa, so this was our first "real" diving experience.

We loved it! We went with a great company called Aqua Nabq, and had excellent lunches and wonderful, sunny days exploring a bunch of different dive sites. We used our GoPro to take video and pictures. Here's the video, and a few favorite snaps!

October 01, 2017

Valley of the Kings & the Temples of Luxor, Egypt

October 01, 2017/ Samantha Parsons

Our first day in Luxor we went to the West Bank of the Nile River to see some of the many temples and sights. First, we stopped at the Valley of the Kings, which is a valley where tombs of Pharaohs were cut into the rock. This mainly took place from the 16th to the 11th century BC, which is part of what makes it such an amazing and famous site.

September 26, 2017

Kom Ombo, Edfu, and Esna Temples, Egypt

September 26, 2017/ Charlie Parsons

These three temples are situated along the Nile to the north of Aswan. We still had Mena with us, and we made stops at each on our way to Luxor. The our first stop was at Kom Ombo temple.

September 24, 2017

Aswan & Philae Island, Egypt

September 24, 2017/ Charlie Parsons

The three main sights we visited were the Aswan High Dam, the Philae temple, and the Unfinished obelisk. They weren't as impressive as the incredible temples we saw in Abu Simbel, but they were definitely worth seeing, though the High Dam was a little underwhelming.

September 21, 2017

Temples of Abu Simbel, Egypt

September 21, 2017/ Samantha Parsons

We hired an Egyptologist guide and a driver to drive us the three hours south to Abu Simbel through the barren desert. It's about 40 kilometers from the Sudan border, and the town of Abu Simbel is quite small.

September 20, 2017

Catacombs in Alexandria, Egypt

September 20, 2017/ Charlie Parsons

We spent a quick three days in Alexandria after our time in Cairo. To be completely honest, this is a city I should have researched a little more before visiting than I did. Maybe even just Googling it. I didn't know that the ancient lighthouse was no longer standing.

September 17, 2017

Cairo, Camels, and the Pyramids

September 17, 2017/ Samantha Parsons

I’ve been to Egypt once before, in 2013 with my friend Chris Simpson, and absolutely loved it. Seeing the pyramids at Giza and the Valley of the Kings near Luxor is an unforgettable experience. Unfortunately, on that trip we didn’t get to visit Abu Simbel, so Chuck and I decided to visit Egypt on our travels so I could check that off my list, and so he could see Egypt for the first time.